California Cannabis Updates

Last-known Californian in prison for federal cannabis charges released after 15 years

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2 years ago

March 6, 2023

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CBS news

Medical marijuana has been legal in California for more than a quarter of a century, but the impact of the federal ban is still apparent all these years later. One Bay Area man is finally free after serving 15 years in prison for opening a licensed medical cannabis shop.

Luke Scarmazzo represents the end of an era. He is the last known Californian to be released from prison for a federal medical cannabis charge.

It’s been just 20 days since Scarmazzo was released, and he’s still adjusting to his life back in Modesto.

“I’m making a chicken salad lunch – something I didn’t get to do a lot in prison so I’m, like, super taking advantage of it,” Scarmazzo told CBS News Bay Area.

He crunches up Doritos to top his salad, a trick he picked up while serving nearly 15 years of a 22-year federal sentence.

In 2004 Scarmazzo and his business partner opened the first licensed medical cannabis store in the Central Valley.

“It was an uncertainty, it was an unknown,” Scarmazzo explained. “It was something that hadn’t been done before so there were a lot of what-ifs. We knew we would get some pushback because the Central Valley tends to be more conservative but we couldn’t imagine what ended up happening.”

At first, he saw huge success in part due to local regulations that created a monopoly for his business. It quickly turned into a passion, helping people going through intense treatments ease their pains.

“There was some loose regulation but nothing that was exactly how you should operate so we took the route of ‘Let’s go above and beyond on regulation,’” Scarmazzo said. “But when the city realized what they had done they called the federal government.”

Medicinal cannabis has been legal in California since 1996 and recreationally since 2018. But possession and distribution of cannabis — medicinal or not — remains illegal under federal law and carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 20 years, just what Scarmazzo received.

“[I thought] this can’t be true, like, how did we do everything right and follow all the state laws and do everything we were supposed to do and be found guilty of a charge that will put us away for 20-plus years?” said Scarmazzo.

Over the next 15 years he was transferred to several federal prisons across the country, an experience he describes as traumatic. But the worst part, he said, was being away from his daughter who is now 20 years old.

“It didn’t feel like we were wrongly convicted but it felt like it was an injustice not only for the amount of time we received on a first-time drug offense,” Scarmazzo recalled. “It had to be somebody and it might as well have been me.”

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California Cannabis Updates

August 23 2024: Department of Cannabis Control Files Emergency Rulemaking Action to Readopt Cultivation License Changes pursuant to Business and Professions Code section 26061.5

Published

3 months ago

August 24, 2024

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Department of Cannabis Control Files Emergency Rulemaking Action to Readopt Cultivation License Changes pursuant to Business and Professions Code section 26061.5

August 23, 2024

The Department of Cannabis Control (DCC) has filed an action with the Office of Administrative Law (OAL) to readopt its emergency regulations implementing Senate Bill 833, codified in Business and Professions Code section 26061.5, which requires the DCC to allow cultivation licensees to make certain changes including: change the type of size of a cultivation license; place a cultivation license in inactive status; or make a one-time change to a cultivation license’s date of renewal.

View the proposed finding of emergency and notice of proposed adoption and the proposed text of emergency regulations below:

The five-calendar day public comment period for this emergency action starts once OAL posts notice of the filing on its website. Emergency regulations under review by OAL can be found on its Emergency Regulation’s Under Review webpage.

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California Cannabis Updates

Oakland police seize banned tobacco products, psilocybin candy bars from smoke shop

Published

4 months ago

July 13, 2024

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Oakland police are investigating an unlicensed smoke shop in East Oakland where officers seized several illegal products earlier this week, including cartons of banned tobacco products from out of state and nearly 10 pounds of marijuana bud.

Police on Wednesday confiscated other items at the shop in the 2500 block of Seminary Avenue that included Psilocybin “magic” mushroom candy bars and close to 20 pounds of suspected THC products.

Officers with the police department’s Alcohol Beverage Action Team were following up on anonymous complaints about the shop. In addition to seizing illegal items, they detained a store clerk.

No arrests were made, but the case will be forwarded to the Alameda County District Attorney’s office for further action, including civil charges and potential eviction, police said in a news release on Thursday.

https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/east-oakland-smoke-shop-bust-illegal-tobacco-marijuana-mushrooms-thc-seminary-avenue/

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California Cannabis Updates

CBS News Report: Cannabis-legal California battling surging illegal marijuana operations

Published

2 years ago

April 4, 2023

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DISCOVERY BAY – In a state where cannabis is widely legalized, California still has a significant illegal marijuana scene. The state Department of Cannabis Control (DCC) is only two years old but is quickly tackling and dismantling these operations.

For Bill Jones of the DCC, it was just another Tuesday as he pulled up to an unsuspecting house in a gated neighborhood. To the untrained eye, one would never guess what was hiding inside.

“It really could be anywhere,” Jones told CBS News Bay Area. “It could be your neighborhood, could be my neighborhood.

CBS News Bay Area was invited on a ride along while DCC officers executed search warrants and seized illegal crops.

Inside four homes in a Discovery Bay neighborhood, officers found illegal cannabis operations.

“We’re going to see anywhere between 3,000 to 5,000 plants,” Jones said. “And we’re talking about a square mile here.”

Jones has been in law enforcement for nearly three decades and the DCC holds a personal significance as he was part of the team tasked with standing the department up in 2021.

“I hired all these officers,” Jones said. “I’m so proud of my people. They work so hard.”

Upon entry into the house, the smell of cannabis fills the space and each room has its own microclimate as those who tended to the crop closely monitored the environment of the plants. But in doing so, the practice created an illegal and hazardous space.

“There’s a really sharp contrast between the illegal cannabis market and the licensed cannabis market,” Jones explained. “The illegal market which in part has criminal organizations like Mexican cartels and Chinese triads and other transnational criminal organizations operating it. They pay no taxes, they have no concerns about how they grow and distribute, they use banned chemicals and pesticides. They take advantage of their employees, sometimes they even engage in human trafficking.”

In the first two stops, officers seized nearly 2,000 plants totaling 1,000 pounds of cannabis.

Read full report

https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/cannabis-control-ride-pot-bust-grow-house-discovery-bay/

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